Used to be, if you wanted to tell the people you were zooming past on the highway that you were a Dale Earnhardt Jr. fan or an animal lover or a square dancer, you bought a bumper sticker. ...

Now, you contact your legislators and ask them to create yet another special license tag. ...

We've got tags commemorating wild turkeys, ducks and fish, Lions, Shriners and Masons, technology and nurses and organ donations, and every S.C. college you can name. Ninety-six separate special license tags available to the general public. ...

As if that weren't bad enough, now legislators are poised to authorize ''I Believe'' tags, with ''a cross superimposed on a stained glass window,'' and they're not even slowing down to consider what they're doing. ...

Back in 2001, the Legislature authorized special ''Choose Life'' tags, which were to double as a fundraiser for crisis pregnancy programs. A lawsuit followed, and the Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals - the most conservative in the nation - struck down the law, ruling that the tags provided a forum for one group's political views and not another's. In addition to having to cover the state's costs, taxpayers had to pay the legal fees for Planned Parenthood, which topped $150,000. ...

Our lawmakers shouldn't need a court to tell them not to hawk these new license plates. Even if they believe turning license plates into bumper stickers is a good idea - and clearly they do - they ought to draw the line at throwing away money on lawsuits whose outcome is not in doubt.

The (Columbia) State